Thursday digest

- Here's an amazing story about a real survivor here in Ottawa. Think you've had a rough go of things? Not like this guy has, and he's still thankful and happy to be alive.

- McCain and Lieberman on the troop surge.

- A total of 14 members of the Carter Centre have resigned in protest over Jimmy Carter's book.

Ouch.

- As the Democrats move to tackle income inequality south of the border, here in Canada socialist NDP leader Jack Layton, whose national support usually varies between 11% and 17% of Canadians, is following their lead.

According to Layton, "(n)either Harper nor Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion 'understand the concerns of ordinary Canadians' ... '(T)hey don't get it. They don't understand what is on their minds'".

One then has to wonder why the ratio of the voting public who rejects the NDP is consistently greater than even the ratio of dentists who recommend Dentyne chewing gum (that's four out of five, if you've forgotten).

It couldn't be that ordinary Canadians just don't know what's best for themselves, could it, Jack?

- Add American flags on firefighters' lockers to the list of things the New York city government is trying to ban.

- Today's Daily Digest will conclude with a few observations culled from elsewhere in the blogosphere today.

First, Skeelo discusses the likelihood of Hockey Night in Canada moving to CTV next year and concludes that if that happens, the CBC will become utterly pointless.

Next, David over at the Parking Lot rightfully laments the decline in society's intellectual standards.

Finally, this blogger points us towards something that should have been said a long time ago, and that's this: Robin Williams = embarassingly unfunny.